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My computer’s doing some funky review stuff right now – if you guys see red text and it’s giving you issues, I can resolve it for individual sections
1AC
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2ac separation of powers
Checks and self-restraint solve
Prakash and Ramsey ‘12 (Saikrishna B, David Lurton Massee, Jr. Professor of Law and Sullivan and Cromwell Professor of Law, University of Virginia School of Law and Michael D, Professor of Law, University of San Diego School of Law, review of The Executive Unbound, Texas Law Review (2012) 90:973, YX)
Yet we doubt the book’s central claim that we live in a post-Madisonian republic. First, the U.S. Executive is very much bound—by the Constitution, Congress’s laws, and the courts. Though we cannot peer into the many minds populating the Executive Branch, we do not believe that executiveofficials regard themselves as above the law and the courts, answerable only to the people via elections and polls. The Executive Branch does not act this way, and most of its actions are consistent with its own sense of what the law requires and forbids (although, like most actors, it often reads the law to maximize its discretion). To be sure, the Executive Branch takes advantageof gaps and ambiguities in the law, as well as its speed, decisiveness, andaccess to information, all as The Executive Unbound describes.5 But the Executive does not systematically disregard orders from Congress or thecourts nor does it usually exercise core powers that the Constitution assignselsewhere; the Executive does not impose criminal punishments, spend money without authorization, or rule by decree.Second, while we agree with Posner and Vermeule that public opinion colors Executive Branch decision making, we also believe that the publicfavors an executive bound by the law.So long as the public expects the lawto constrain the Executive, the Executive will take into account this expectation and the public’s sense of the law, even under Posner and Vermeule’s own light. In other words, the public has a taste for the rule of law, a tastethat the Executive Branch ignores at its peril.We think the legal constraints on the modern Executive are so manifest that we wonder whether Posner and Vermeule’s real project is more aspirational than descriptive. Perhaps their ultimate objective is to persuade us that we should have an unbound executive, not that we already have one. We hedge here because the book seems of two minds. In keeping with the title, most of the book forcefully argues that the Executive faces no material legal constraints. For instance, Posner and Vermeule write that “the legally constrained executive is now a historical curiosity”6 and that the Madisonian separation of powers has “collapsed.”7 There is no equivocation here. Yet Chapter 6 argues that irrational fear of executive tyranny has prevented the Executive from obtaining powers needed to handle modern emergencies.8 Obviously this complaint assumes that there are constraints on the Executive. And the conclusion in particular appears to admit that the courts andCongress check the Executive—that the Executive is bound and that theMadisonian republic lives on.
Hundreds of XOs all the time thump
2ac gradualism da
Raul’s reforms fail now
Perez-Stable, 2011 (Marifeli, Professor of Sociology at Florida Internatonal University and non-resident senior fellow at the Inter-American Dialogue, The United States and Cuba “Policy in Place for 50 Years Hasn’t Worked”)
At the beginning of 2010, the Cuban government continued to move slowly on domestic matters. The disastrous 2008 hurricane season only served to heighten the leadership's indecisiveness on economic reforms, which in any case never lived up to the expectations raised by Raul Castro's earlier call for "structural changes." Still, throughout 2009, ordinary Cubans heard hints of change. There were calls to increase productivity and warnings that some subsidies would be reduced or eliminated. There was talk of doing away with the ration book, and there was a new slogan, /ahorro o muerte! (saving or death!), along with critiques of the "paternalistic state."96 The latter, of course, followed naturally from the revolution's socialist turn as well as the Comandante's aversion to decentralization and the market. In keeping with his emphasis on la institucionalidad, Raul Castro led a whirlwind of meetings in mid-2009: the National Defense Council, the1' Council of Ministers, the Cuban Communist Party's Central Committee (CC) and the National Assembly. The CC meeting postponed the Party Congress, which had been scheduled for the second half of 2009. In Castro's words,¶ "identifying our principal problems will take us some more time."97 Cuba's "principal problems," however, had long been identified. In 1970, Fidel Castro acknowledged them, and Granma reprinted an excerpt of his speech in November 2009:¶ Lack of productivity is an abyss that threatens to swallow our human resources and the country's wealth. We have to become aware, the workers need to raise their conciencia about this problem. We need to overcome bottlenecks, be more organized, work diligendy every day with more discipline, rationality, common sense.98¶ From the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s the Cuban economy registered modest growth only after the government received large increases in Soviet subsidies and applied the post-Stalinist model of relative decentralization and material incentives. Unlike his brother, Raul Castro embraced market socialism and remained more open to economic reforms, except he favored a failed model over the model that has yielded economic success for China and Vietnam. More than three years after succeeding the Comandante, Raul had thwarted popular expectations that his government might create "a breathing space and perhaps a turning point in the nation's economic environment," and opted instead to prolong the status quo "in spite of its manifest inefficiency."99 As a result, the Cuban economy tottered, its fragility no doubt aggravated by the global financial crisis. Still, in good or bad times, the regime never put forward an economic program that placed living standards and individual initiatives at the center. Instead, it preferred token measures such as allowing beauticians to take over Havana beauty shops by paying a $45 monthly tax or piloting a program that permitted taxi drivers to use their vehicles as their own if they assumed responsibility for maintenance. In the meantime, the state sector was bloated by at least a million excess workers.100¶ In part, Cuban leaders had failed to grapple with the country's economic woes due to their military mindset. At the Central Committee gathering in late July 2009, Raul Castro repeatedly mentioned the party's failure to replicate in the economy the strength it had achieved with its armed forces. Both, he added, were equally essential to national security.101 In the early 1990s, when he was defense minister, he had said something similar: "Beans are more important than cannons."102 Each sector, however, thrives on different principles: A strong military depends on an inviolable discipline down the chain of command; a strong economy needs entrepreneurship, innovation, competition and, yes, self-interest. At the CC meeting, Raul brought up "false unanimity," a pernicious practice that he said stifled "debate and a healthy discrepancy." His words harked back to the Llamamiento, the convocation of the 1992 party congress that . decried la doble moral—saying one thing in public while believing another—and called on the citizenry to speak out without el a/an de unanimidad, the zeal of¶ unanimity.103 A few years later, Raul said it differently: "We need to learn to disagree with those in charge. We don't say anything in meetings but we talk endlessly in hallways."104 Raul was, nonetheless, not inviting disagreements with the Comandante, himself or the PCC. How else but under constitutionally guaranteed civil liberties could citizens feel safe to freely express healthy discrepancies?
The AFF causes gradualism – loosening restrictions on travel has minimal immediate effect on democratic transition
AFP 11 (American Foreign Policy Magazine, Princeton Student Editorials on Global Politics. "Ending the Embargo Against Cuba: Why Obama’s Baby Steps Are Not Enough" March 16, 2011. afpprinceton.com/2011/03/ending-the-embargo-against-cuba-why-obama’s-baby-steps-are-not-enough/)
As the presidential election of 2012 approaches, more and more critics are deriding President Obama’s pre-election vision of hope and change, targeting what they consider to be Obama’s naivete in foreign policy. This January, however, the president announced one significant foreign policy reform that he hopes will counter such criticism. In a memorandum entitled “Reaching Out to the Cuban People,” he detailed foreign policy changes between the United States and Cuba that ease the fifty-year American embargo on Cuba. The three-part reform measure that has gone largely unnoticed attempts to create more contact with the citizens of Cuba, and the changes it implements are certainly admirable. As its failures over the past fifty years have shown, however, the embargo is a Cold War remnant of political tension that is hurting American industry, America’s reputation abroad, and most directly, the Cuban people. Analysis of the negative ramifications of the embargo reveals that President Obama should fully end the oppressive embargo and reconnect the United States with the Cuban citizenry.¶ The economic embargo was first enacted in 1960 as the swift answer to communist President Fidel Castro’s seizure of American property in Cuba. Since then, every American president has maintained the embargo in some form, with a conditional promise to lift it when Cuba adopts a democratic system of government.¶ Last year, President Obama ended restrictions on travel and cash remittances by family members of Cubans, but his newest move has forced politicians and citizens alike to reconsider the issue. Although Cuba is still not fully open to the public and businesses, the new policy aims “to enhance contact with the Cuban people and support civil society” by allowing approved licensed travelers for “purposeful travel.”¶ Following the changes, a variety of groups can visit the communist state: religious organizations are now able to travel for missionary purposes, academic institutions are able to sponsor study abroad programs, and cultural groups are encouraged to host conferences along with other forms of “educational exchange.” Additionally, reporters have been given more freedom to travel to Cuba for journalistic purposes. The new policy also allows remittances of $500 per quarter that can be sent by Americans to Cuban citizens (excluding senior Cuban government officials and members of the Communist Party). The final part of the memorandum affects charter flights to Cuba which had been previously restricted to Miami and a few other airports. Now, all international airports can apply for licenses allowing flights to Cuba for family members and others engaging in “purposeful travel.”¶ The loosening of restrictions continues a series of recent improvements in American-Cuban relations. Although Cuba is undoubtedly facing economic woes—500,000 government workers were laid off last September—citizens are slowly approaching true political freedom. In February 2008, Fidel Castro resigned from his position as president of Cuba due to health reasons, and Cuba’s National Assembly selected his relatively moderate brother, Raul, as his successor. When taking office, Raul Castro suggested that Cuba may be headed “toward a more democratic society,” and Cuba is indeed showing signs of change. In 2009 Raul Castro offered to speak with President Obama, saying, “We have sent word to the U.S. government in private and in public that we are willing to discuss everything, human rights, freedom of the press, political prisoners, everything.” Citizens in Cuba are now allowed to own cell phones, and farmers can till their own land. Most recently, Cuba has been releasing political prisoners, some of whom had been sentenced to decades of imprisonment.¶ The political buzz generated by the memorandum is to be expected, given that the embargo policy has been a part of American diplomacy for fifty years. Like most members of his party, Cornelius Mack (R-FL) had harsh feelings toward the president’s policy change, saying that the “dictatorship is one of the most brutal in the world. The U.S. economic embargo must remain in place until tyranny gives way to freedom and democracy.” In a statement that defied the Democratic party line, Cuban-American Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) echoed the sentiments, calling the loosening of the embargo a “gift to the Castro brothers [that] will provide the regime with the additional resources it needs to sustain its failing economy.”¶ Yet the changes are also receiving support from varied sources. Pepe Hernandez, head of the Cuban-American National Foundation, praised the shift for allowing impoverished Cubans to fight for economic independence from the Castro administration. Rev. Michael Kinnamon, speaking on behalf of the National Council of Churches, commended the move, saying, “We look forward to the day when the U. S. embargo of Cuba will be lifted completely.” Even some Republicans favor the change, including Senator Richard Lugar, who said last year that “the unilateral embargo on Cuba has failed to achieve its stated purpose of “bringing democracy to the Cuban people.”¶ Those who still favor the use of the embargo see it as a way to pressure the communist regime of Cuba. The idea was that, the embargo would inflict hunger and suffering among Cubans, weakening the regime and even spurring a revolt against the Castro regime. But Lugar is correct: the failed history of the embargo should disabuse us of this notion. Over the last five decades, American-Cuban relations have been characterized by stagnation and hostility. The country has certainly shown signs of hardship, but the Cuban people have not been able to organize and protest against the government. Instead, Fidel Castro was able to rule with an iron first, before handing the presidency to his brother. Fidel Castro continues issue regular tirades in the newspaper Granma, which serves as the mouthpiece for the Cuban Communist Party. Clearly, the outdated embargo has served to strengthen the Castro regime, rather than create extreme instability. Perhaps most tragic has been the fate of the Cuban people, who continue to suffer economically, politically, and even emotionally: the nation has one of the highest suicide rates in the world.¶ Although the president deserves praise for the diplomatic changes, they are not new. During the Carter and Clinton administrations, similar restrictions were lifted, but the changes were short-lived. Moreover, the embargo under the George W. Bush administration was very strictly enforced, effectively negating Clinton’s reforms. The recent changes loosen the restrictions, but the basic tenet of banned trade remains intact. American industries are still not permitted to engage in business with the communist nation. Although weakening the embargo is certainly a step in the right direction, the nation needs to take further steps to end the punitive policy.¶ Increasing contact with the Cuban people is certainly not equivalent to accepting communism. Rather, it exposes Cubans to the democratic principles espoused by the United States and the benefits of capitalism. At the present time, Cubans are inundated with anti-American propaganda spewed by state-run media sources. Even though funds from America may indeed benefit the Cuban economy, it is time to let diplomacy show American support for the Cuban people. By abandoning the Cuban people, the United States is leaving them at the mercy of a communist regime that continues to retain power. Forming economic, academic, and cultural connections will allow the United States to introduce American ideas to Cubans in a peaceful and effective way.¶ In addition to aiding the Cuban people, ending the embargo would strengthen America’s own economic interests and improve her reputation abroad. American businesses currently yearn for the untapped potential present in Cuba, and the opening of trade would help the United States assert dominance during a difficult economic time. Furthermore, the negative global consequences of the embargo would be curbed. Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez called the present embargo a “cruel and aggressive policy absolutely contrary to international law” and much of the international community agrees; in October 2010, the United Nations voted to end the U.S. embargo for the 19th consecutive year, with 187 members voting against the embargo and the only two votes supporting the embargo from the United States and Israel.¶ President Obama has taken a step in the right direction with his modification of the embargo against Cuba, but it is simply not enough. In the current, relatively moderate Cuban political environment, ending the fifty-year-old embargo would give the Cuban people the American economic and cultural connection they sorely need. If Obama limits his actions to the superficial changes of Carter and Clinton, both the president and his policies may be gone in 2012. Relations between the United States and Cuba cannot afford to wait another fifty years.